Science Fiction and Fantasy

Science Fiction and Fantasy Science fiction is stories of the future or past. It is H.G. Wells The Time Machine or The War of the Worlds. It is Jules Verne’s From the Earth to the Moon. though we have now achieved this feat. It is Star Trek and space travel. Fantasy is Harry Potter, witches and goblins, dragons and magic. This blog deals with science fiction only, in its many aspects. I will add a new story every two weeks or so and they all will be different. The first group of stories will be from The World of If. Your comments are welcome.

Roger Lee Vernon

Saturday, May 5, 2007

Science fiction by Roger Lee Vernon

The World of If

In the world of "IF" all futures are possible

Roger Lee Vernon

Contents: The World of If

1. Humans as PetsWhat if people were pets of a more advanced species?

2. The Malthusian MurdersWhat if immortality were for sale?

3. The Wooing of Henry EdmundsWhat if woman's lib became wildly successful?

4. Humpty Dumpty XWhat if first contact was a space war?

5. The Malthusian MurdersWhat if immortality were for sale?

6. The ProdigyWhat if you could remember everything?

7. The Time Tablets TaleWhat if time could be stopped?

8. The Great Encounter . a novellaWhat would the world reaction be if alienstried to save the earth from itself

9. Everywhere ManWhat would happen if you multi-replicated?

Humans as Pets

What if people were pets of a more advanced species?

2The Masters were going to try to mate me again!

This fellow was taller than I and looked to be pleasant enough, so that I thought it was possible.

He seemed to be full-grown, with a lot of facial and chest hair. But most important he knew how to talk in my language.

Hello," he began, smiling shyly, for of course we were both naked except for the security collars.

Since he was naked, it was obvious he was excited at seeing me, but the last candidate had exhibited the same difficulty of control.

"You're very pretty," he added which was unnecessary under the circumstances, for as I said it was obvious how he felt. Perhaps when humans were free, when the people were covered, the men's passions were not so easily seen. But this was a warm planet; we did not really need covering.

Maybe my nudity excited him. I hoped so. My grandmother would have been able to explain all this, but she was long dead.

"Thank you," I replied, standing immobile in the great room.

"The gods brought me to you," he continued, trying to make conversation no doubt.

"They're not gods, but living creatures as we are," I responded. I was hopeful he was not too stupid.

3"I have never seen one of the gods age or die," he divulged, uncertainly. "I have not seen many humans either, but I have seen them age and saw one die." He scratched his head, looking up at a distance where my Master lay in his floating recliner gleaning us from his perch. My Master's six long tentacles were spread out and at rest now.

"They live ten times as long as we do, perhaps longer," I explained, uncertainly. "The child-gods grow larger. So they must also age." It was a simple deduction.

"That is true, about the child-gods. You may be right," he agreed not convinced. I had used the word gods also.

"My grandmother told me many things before I was adopted as a pet in this household," I confided. "We were captured from a human passenger starship when I was just a child. We were traveling together to meet my parents on another planet. My grandmother did not think we ever would be rescued because we were taken a great distance at many times light speed. She said the Masters preyed upon humans, but were kind. I scarcely remember the capture of our ship. I was very young."

I had been sure the Masters were going to breed me because suddenly I had been receiving all this attention. My Mistress' forward tentacles had braided my long hair at intervals before, but now she took more time. When I was allowed indoors, I was accustomed to watching my owner's language antenna vibrate, twitch with amusement

4as I rolled around on the soft rug to dry myself after the bathing pool. I did this way of drying for I knew of no other way to achieve the desired effect in the humid climate. My drying method frequently brought amusement to the Masters. Often I had been anointed with the cleansing oil after being flung into the bathing pool to wash myself, as a good pet. But this time, after l emerged from the pool, my whole body was coated with perfume, an aphrodisiac, I decided, for I felt a strong glowing feeling. My grandmother told me this would happen when I was grown and I should anticipate the event.

This was the warm season, really blinding hot from the double suns, and I was being kept outdoors most of the time. Outside, I usually just stayed on my pillows in the shade of the roof overhang. Today after the bathing pool I was allowed to come indoors to the great room where I lay on the rug, feeling the pleasing tickle of the fibers on my skin as I rolled. Then I was anointed. The heady smell of their aphrodisiac perfume had its desired effect, and I soon felt sexually aroused. I could feel the induced passion and struggled to control it.

Then one of the child Masters, a godling I suppose the stranger would have called him, picked me up. He held me frighteningly high in but one of his sturdy tentacles. The suction cups, which could administer such pain, were gentle now. The young had been warned not to hurt me in the long ago. The godling's antenna twitched in pleasure at my discomfort and helplessness.

5All my life since the crèche in this household I had lived with these Masters and I still could not communicate with these gods. Our senses did not match. They uttered no sounds. They could not hear.

They could see, but not as I did. They could smell things so accurately, telling even how long the smell had been there and from which direction it had come. But most importantly they sensed by waves every object around them. I had learned the meaning of some of their antenna movements, perhaps two dozen. I knew my name when I was called, and the names of tricks I was supposed to perform for their pleasure, to show how clever I was. Performing these tricks caused the Masters to show satisfaction and I was often rewarded with food treats and playthings.

The call for these tricks by antenna movement caused me to try to please the masters, so I would on command "Stand," "Sit," "Lie down," "Roll Over," "Jump," "Get," which meant I was to run after a ball that had been flung and throw it back. Those things I knew. I knew "Beg," which meant I was to stand with my hands elevated toward the high table until one of the Masters realized I was there and then catch the food thrown. This last was plainly degrading, but better than a continuous diet of the same processed food that I was fed in my bowl on the floor.

Now my life was about to take a new turn, for I knew nothing of the mating process or the aftermath. No doubt the Masters would help me. The last candidate for my affection had spoken a strange tongue

6and was neither clean nor pleasing to me. I ran from him even though the Masters coaxed me.

"You tell me first," I demanded. I was hungry for knowledge and desirous of control.

"I was born to the crèche," he related. "My mother taught me the language I know, and we were together when I was a child. But she too had been born here." He paused. "That was long ago," he continued. "I was adopted by a family of the immortal gods. Tell me more of what you know."

I shrugged. He could call them gods all he wanted. "It is obvious you are a second generation pet, bred and raised in captivity. My grandmother stayed with me till she died. She taught me much. We humans have a great civilization somewhere, a place called Earth, and we have colonies among the stars. But the Masters are superior and raid our spaceships at will to seize us for pets or zoo animals sometimes."

"What is a zoo?" he asked.

"A place where various species are placed so that the Masters can go to look at them. I was allowed along once to observe such a place. My Masters brought me to see my reaction. I was naturally on a leash."

"Do you understand their language?" he inquired. "They vibrate their antenna at times. But I do not follow it."

7"The antenna are for communication. The tentacles are for seizing things. The pods on the tentacles can inflict great pain."

"Yes I have felt that," he informed me. "I was pained at times until I learned to go outdoors properly. But that was when I was still a child."

"Did you never try to escape?" I asked.

"Escape to what?" he asked. "Yes, I ran off once, but the collar, it hurt more the further I ran away. And the gods knew exactly where I was by the collar. Once I tried to remove it with a tool I found, but the pain was even greater then. It finally put me to sleep. Did you ever try to run off?"

"Yes. It may be in our nature. My grandmother said it was hopeless, but as a child I did this too."

And I thought of the times when the leash was attached to my collar and I was taken for a walk in the neighborhood around here. My Masters in their floating recliner above me actually seemed quite proud of me. Maybe it was because I was a possession. There were a pair of pets in the next plantation, a long way off, and I had seen them several times when my Masters took me there. But they were females, as I, and did not speak my language. Or perhaps they knew no language. They hung back when my Child-Master brought me near them. When I spoke to them they did not answer.

Yes, there was a great outside world here and also above in the stars. Sometimes I looked up at the stars and imagined which sun

8might be near our original home planet. Were we Masters there? Did we have pets there? That thought was almost too much.

Now my human male visitor was talking again. "But the antenna are still a mystery to me," he confided. "They flick in certain ways, but it is too fast to follow."

"The movements all have a meaning, but I know only a few of them," I answered. I told him briefly what I knew.

He nodded and took a step closer. I felt the passion grow.

"I was brought here for a purpose," he divulged, as if I did not know.

"And what purpose was that?" I asked coyly. What would he say?

"I don't understand. But I find you most beautiful."

Again he took a tentative step closer, as if he would run back if I showed fright or said the wrong thing. "I know nothing about these things," I indicated. "Yet I greet you." The Masters were watching from on high in their floating perches, but I did not care. They always watched. They had examined me all over when I was a child, perhaps looking for imperfections. Are any of us perfect? My Masters had taught me where it was suitable to defecate in the garden. I preferred a high flower bed where I could not be seen easily. They had been my Masters almost all my life. They took me to be examined at long intervals by other Masters who knew more about humans. I believed this was to determine my health. Sometimes I was given tablets to take and took them without question.

9Now my visitor took yet another step closer. It was time! For what I did not know. I extended my arms to him, welcoming this shy one. It pleased me he was shy and moved slowly.

He was so close now that his next two steps brought us together. My feeling of passion now became unbearable as his arms held me and I felt his bare skin. I can't believe I voiced it, but the words gushed out from me: "Perhaps we should lie down."

The pain and the pleasure intermingled. Afterwards we lay side by side on the rug for a long time looking at one another. Then I felt his desire stir again and we locked in another embrace.

Exhausted we lay face to face once more. "Probably we will never see each other again," I blurted out my sudden thought. "Now that this is over." I felt terribly sad about that.Above I noticed my Master floating on his perch, watching, and his antenna above his great eyes were flickering in satisfaction.

I had an identification tag on my pierced earlobe and the man fondled this. "Don't pull it off, that would hurt." I told him.

"I have one too," he replied, showing me.

"I can not read the inscription," I informed him. "We're both pets, both domesticated. But I still sometimes think of escape."

"We would revert to the wild," he suggested.

"No. We were never wild," I told him. "We were all kidnapped from passenger space craft. We are humans who belong to a great civilization. We are so far away from our home planet I do not think we will ever be rescued. The Masters know this, for according to my grandmother their ships are vastly faster than ours and travel further among the stars."

Suddenly I could see by the look in his eyes that he did not understand and would never understand. "The gods have tested you for your time, no doubt," the human man confided to me. Now it was my turn to be not sure what he meant. "You are right about us not seeing each other again. If you are with child, then we are finished. Only when it does not succeed, will I be allowed back."

Suddenly I knew. "You have done this before. You are used by the Masters to produce children in the female pets."

"Yes, but you are beautiful." Those were the words he knew and they came out too easily, too often.

"How many times?" I demanded, my anger building.

"I do not know. I can not count. My mother counted for me on my fingers, but that is not enough."

He began to back away, as if he knew what was coming, but he was not fast enough. I swung my fist at his face hard. His ignorance and single-minded purpose angered me.

Now he jumped up, wiping the blood from his nose. "Thank you," he declared and left hurriedly before I could arise.